Tonight’s a special occasion. No, it’s not a holiday…Nope, not a birthday. What’s happening? I just opened up a bottle of El Dorado 21 Year Old Special Reserve Rum. What’s a more special occasion than that? Not much in my opinion. So, here we go.

While it looks almost the exact same as the 12 and 15 year old rums from El Dorado, this one is just ever so slightly different with a 21 on the front. Oh those folks in marketing and branding spent weeks on this detail.

The El Dorado 21 is from Guyana and uses a special recipe blend of hand selected rums, oak aged for AT LEAST 21 years in bourbon barrels and distilled from fermented molasses.

Opening the bottle, plastic cap with a cork stopper, you could smell summer. Pouring it into the snifter hints of vanilla, oak and brown spices hit the air as the deep copper/bronze colored liquid hits the glass. Now, time for the real test… the taste. Mmmmm. Ok, let’s give a little better description, how’s this? Mmmmmmmmmmmmm! OK, just playing with you. I really do like it a lot though. Silky and velvety. Smells sweet like vanilla and cream with a tad of spice but truthfully, there is a lot of complexity that just can not be described, at least not by me. The flavor is strong yet very smooth with a caramel/oak taste. At first you get a little burn but you don’t mind, it’s a good burn that you kinda feel bad for liking but you do anyway. It finishes smoothly with a hint of citrus and smokiness. Nice!

I’ve always been happy with El Dorado’s 15 year old rum, now, I have to spend a little more for the 21 year old. The price in the Nashville area was around $50 but I have seen it elsewhere for as high as $100 which makes me feel good about being in Nashville. If you see it out, grab one, it’s worth the price!

At the end of December a wonderful thing happened, Tennessee based Prichard’s Distillery and Nashville, TN based Olive and Sinclair Chocolate Company released their collaboration Double Chocolate Bourbon Whiskey. At first you may be thinking that this would be a sacrilegious experiment trying to make bourbon into a vodka for girly chocolate martinis, let quickly calm your nerves to know that this is pure heaven. Instead of going for the creamy smooth rich chocolate taste that would ruin a great bourbon, they grasped for more of the cocoa bean essence which blend wonderfully with the bourbon.

The Double Barreled Bourbon normally has a toffee, vanilla, caramel, dried fruit flavor to it that when adding the cocoa bean flavor makes it pop to the perfect sipping whiskey. For around $55, it’s a bit steep but a nice whiskey to add to your collection and have around the house. Next up, I have to see how it tastes in a Manhattan!

A good friend turned me on to Bulleit Bourbon a little over a year ago. I was scared with the bottle at first, it looked a little red necked and the store I was in didn’t help out either. I got it though and I am oh so glad I did. This is now the go to bourbon in our house. On average it runs just a couple bucks more than Jim Beam and it is oh so worth it. It stands on it’s own with hints of oak and spice and notes of vanilla and honey and goes great in your favorite recipe. My favorite with Bulleit is the Old Fashioned.